ESCONDIDO COUNCIL VOTES TO PROTECT OPEN SPACE

Council backs residents over developer, who has sued for right to build

ESCONDIDO 
Escondido City Council members voted unanimously Wednesday to preserve a defunct golf course as open space, potentially blocking a developer’s proposal to build 283 homes there.

The vote was a major victory for hundreds of residents living near the Escondido Country Club golf course who have been fighting the proposed subdivision since early this year. An initiative launched this spring by the residents became city law with the council’s vote Wednesday. The council could have chosen to place the measure on the 2014 ballot but instead voted to adopt it immediately.

The developer, Michael Schlesinger, filed a lawsuit in June claiming the initiative violates his private property rights, because declaring the course open space makes it worthless to him. That litigation could allow him to build the subdivision or collect millions from the city in damages. But council members expressed confidence Wednesday that the city would prevail in court.

Councilman John Masson said Schlesinger mistakenly concluded he could close the 18-hole golf course and build housing there because it’s residentially zoned. But Masson said Schlesinger doesn’t have the right to build on land that’s been intended as open space since the golf course and surrounding homes were built in the 1960s.

“The property rights in question here are those of the Country Club residents,” Masson said. “It’s clear to me this was a master-planned community with a golf course.”

Mayor Sam Abed and the rest of the council said they weren’t experts on property rights or “takings” lawsuits, but that they chose to rely on City Attorney Jeff Epp and other city staff.

Some property right experts have said the city could be vulnerable in this case. But Epp said he’s more confident than he was in a property rights lawsuit involving mobile home parks that Escondido took all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and won in 1992.

Paul Robinson, one of Schlesinger’s attorneys, said after the meeting that the council’s vote had brought the takings portion of Schlesinger’s lawsuit to the forefront of the litigation. Attorneys for the city and Schlesinger are scheduled to appear before Vista Superior Court Judge Earl Maas on Sept. 5.

Jerry Swadley, leader of the resident group, said after the meeting that he is open to discussing a compromise with Schlesinger — possibly a smaller subdivision and a nine-hole golf course. Schlesinger said Wednesday the city and its taxpayers could end up owing him more than $100 million.